Le commissaire X traque les chiens verts

My first Kommissar X experience was the fourth film in the series, Kill Me Gently, which was something of a mess. Kiss Kiss, Kill Kill, the first in the series, is much more fun, a cheesy Bond-style espionage caper with not one, but two heroes trying to thwart a power-hungry villain out to own the world's largest gold reserve.

Private detective Jo Walker (Tony Kendall) and police captain Tom Rowland (Brad Harris) investigate the disappearance of a nuclear physicist and the murder of several shady businessmen. The trail eventually leads to O'Brien (Nikola Popovic), who has been killing off his business partners in order to gain complete control of the gold that they have amassed on their island fortress.

With suave protagonists, sexy women (including an army of curvaceous mind-controlled blondes), and a ruthless megalomaniac, plus lots of fisticuffs, shootouts, and an explosive finale in the baddie's lair, this is entertaining nonsense for fans of '60s spy flicks - the type of films so mercilessly spoofed by Austin Powers.

Exciting Euro Spy thriller even if you're not sure what it's all about. A couple of underworld figures get blown up by a rival named Oberon ostensibly to eliminate them from getting a cut in a big deal he is cooking up. He instructs his right hand gal, Maria Perschy, to contact Jo Walker who's on holiday in the area. She puts Walker on retainer to find a nuclear physicist (they were popular victims and hostages in the 60s) and gives him dancer Lilane Dulovic as a lead. Following a somewhat romantic visit with Jo, she is murdered during a performance and that gets Jo reunited with old friend and fellow crime-fighter Captain Tom who is called into the case. The movie then trends in a direction reminiscent of Goldfinger. There's some great vintage cars (Jo's Porsche Speedster for one), scantily clad gals, good cinematography, and Bond-like action (Not to mention the theme song which gets replayed several times). The plot itself is fairly amorphous but who cares. It's a lot of fun especially if you like these 60's Euro spy flicks.

This movie essentially begins with a private detective by the name of "Joe Walker" (Tony Kendall) who is on vacation but finds himself being recruited by a woman named "Nancy Wright" (Liliane Dulovic) to locate a certain nuclear physicist who has gone missing. Also interested in his investigation is a woman named "Joan Smith" (Maria Perschy) who works for a man named "Mr. Oberon" (Nikola Popovic) and appears to have an alternate agenda as well. Assisting Joe with his investigation is a police officer by the name of "Captain Tom Roland" (Brad Harris) who seems to have an uncanny knack for interfering more than he helps. In any case, this was an interesting "Eurospy" film which is definitely enhanced by the serious plot and several attractive female actresses which include Christa Linder (as "Pamela Watson") along with the aforementioned Maria Perschy and Liliane Dulovic. In any case, while not on the same level as most of the "James Bond" films, this was still an entertaining spy movie in its own right and I have rated it accordingly. Slightly above average.

I started out thinking that this was going to be yet another poorly- executed Bond clone. But once the movie got rolling, it turned out to be a lot of fun.

The two lead characters are both cool and charismatic in their own ways. There's a neat 'buddy-cop' vibe happening here; for the most part -- they're opposites. Tony Kendall's character Jo Walker resembles George Clooney (or maybe George Clooney resembles him) and Brad Harris' Tom Randall almost looks like a classic Bond villain's henchman. Of course, in these movies, he's one of the good guys.

There were moments during this film that I couldn't help but think of Cowboy Bebop for some reason.

Things progress at a good pace. There are plenty of the usual Bond tropes, including scorchingly hot girls, great locations, fast cars, witty dialog, close calls, a classic bad guy (complete with henchman, uber-lair, and nifty hardware), a catchy tune, descent cinematography, and surprisingly good fight scenes.

In short, it was better than expected and features a great dynamic between characters.

Certainly worth a look.

MASTER PLAN: corner the gold market. Probably the most successful of the cheap European James Bond copies, with quite a few sequels. The hero (played by Kendall), detective Walker, resembles Sean Connery, especially when in a suit and hat, recalling the "Dr.No" days, and is more-or-less partnered with a police captain (muscular Brad Harris). The two buddies have a very healthy competition and the captain is more inclined to arrest Walker than fight alongside him at times. The plot involves the mystery of a couple of crime lords getting blown up; there are four top gangsters in all and it becomes obvious that one of them has decided to dissolve their partnership. The tone of the movie is quite cheerful throughout, almost carefree, with Walker very sure of himself and his way with the ladies, though he doesn't have all that much success, either in love or the chasing/gun battles. The film even spells out what franchise it's copying, with references to author Ian Fleming in the dialog. The first half of the film drags a little.

The copycat approach becomes very blatant in the 2nd half, when it switches to the master villain's secret base and becomes, essentially, a remake of Dr.No's 2nd half and "Goldfinger." As with many such action spy thrillers, the 1st half is a standard detective story and the 2nd becomes a sci-fi adventure. As in "Goldfinger," there's a private army of female soldiers, as well as the villain's preoccupation with, you guessed it - gold. One scene is a direct rip-off of James Bond's confrontation/seduction scene with Pussy Galore, followed by a sudden rebellion by all the females - I guess Walker does have a certain charm, after all. The production values aren't too bad in this climactic section and there's actually a minor sense of grandeur by this point, recalling Dr.No's finale, though the villain's demise is a bit lame. The next Kommissar adventure was "So Darling,So Deadly." Heroes:6 Villain:5 Femme Fatales:6 Henchmen:5 Fights:5 Stunts/Chases:5 Gadgets:3 Auto:3 Locations:6 Pace:6 overall:5